About me

My passions are photography, gardening, and travelling.
My husband and I run a business called Bwana Johns in Canada. We design clothing in Thailand, and I spend time in New Zealand where I was born.
I am now managing to garden in Canada, New Zealand and Thailand. At times it seems crazy, but it kinda works.
The focus of the gardening is growing food. Yes there are lots of pretty flowers in the gardens, but I like the idea of growing food that I know hasn't been sprayed with chemicals, and is eaten within minutes of being harvested.
During our travels that find us wandering around Asia and South America, I love finding out how the different cultures grow their food in traditional ways and using some of these ideas in my gardens.
I am fortunate that our business Bwana Johns in cottage country in Ontario, takes us on buying trips to my favourite places.
I spend from late May til September in Canada. I arrive in time for spring planting. The gardens haven't changed much from the previous year, having spent the winter under a thick covering of snow. The challenge here is the short growing season.
In Thailand I spend 2 months before Christmas and another 6 weeks in April/May.At this point I'm not growing much food there, just the flowers. However we are getting involved in an agricultural project growing coffee and avocados. We have some coffee planted, and have a coffee roaster that we've started to roast with . We are planning to spend more time there, and hopefully growing and processing more food items.
In New Zealand I arrive in mid December to a hayfield of weeds both in the yard and in the garden.This takes a fair bit of effort to get under control before the planting starts. With the mild winters, I often find self sown lettuce, brassicas etc, and the fruit trees produce all year round. So there is always an abundance of fresh food here.
Update 2015: We sold our house in New Zealand. Very sad to leave it and the gardens, but it was a little crazy trying to maintain the property only spending 4-5 months a year there.
Now have bought a property on the 51st parallel in coastal British Columbia, Canada. It is 1/3 of an acre so much more manageable. A new growing environment that will have it's own challenges that include way more deer than I am used to and quite cool summers with fresh ocean breezes. The bonus is really long summer days and mild winters.
In 2016 we moved onto a property in Northern Thailand-17th parallel at 1000 mtre altitude. Tropical but cool. It is 1 1/2 acres,so lots of opportunity for gardening here.
The idea is to spend 6 months in each location, but I'm sure our restless feet will keep us travelling to other places through out the year.